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itself when it could not find a partner, using whatever materials came to hand; this was the good luck of having been poor as a child with scarcely a new-bought toy in the house. Only rich children were bored; she had pitied them when she had them in class and still did, though with less forbearance, when they came to her now in her office with their dissatisfactions. Her seat companion’s casual clothes and indifferent manner marked her as having been one of them—even though, by now, she had probably broken with her “filthy rich” parents: as a rising star of the “new journalism,” she could afford that luxury. She had yawned and slept throughout most of the trip, rebuffing the Air France meal and the list of things to buy and the earphones for the movie and yesterday’s Figaro, accepting only two cups of tea, without sugar, despite Aileen’s warning that it would be eleven o’clock at night when they got to Paris, too late to get even a sandwich from room service at the hotel. She was now studying herself, rather angrily, in the mirror of an old Louis Vuitton travel case and jerking a comb through her dark short springy hair which finished in a frizzy bang over her high forehead and in which Aileen had detected with interest two gray threads. On an impulse, Aileen leaned over. “Tell me, honey, how would you sum up, if you had to, our reason for being on this flight?” She was prepared for this advance to be rejected, like all her other overtures, including the kindly hint that it would be wise to take those boots off—the elegant skin-tight things she wore, all the way up the calf, were bound to make the feet swell. But this time the dour young woman smiled. “Interference with the internal affairs of another country?” she suggested. Aileen laughed. At least she had broken the ice.
    The hostess came through, collecting the Air France cards. The rector, in the aisle seat, handed his and the Bishop’s over, duly filled in, and thanked the girl for the flight, just as though she were a real-life hostess. “I’m glad you enjoyed it, sir.” “And our compliments to the pilot,” added the Bishop. “I will tell him, sir.” And probably she would; the human equation still counted in a 707. Aileen’s heart warmed to the two courteous Episcolopians (as they called them back home); they were her idea of old-style American liberals and not afraid of a good time either. Before lunch, they had had a couple of bourbons, and the Reverend had got slightly high, shaking his head in ceaseless wonderment and then going off into roars of laughter that shook his whole body, like somebody being tickled. When he relapsed into gravity, he was the picture of the “concerned clergyman,” all frowns and thoughtfulness, as though the fall of a sparrow had suddenly registered on his radar screen, reminding him of his duty to care. Aileen had had a bourbon herself and half a bottle of wine with her meal, which had made her want to talk, so that from her window seat she would lean across her uncommunicative fellow-traveler and address remarks and questions to the Reverend, before she finally got up—when the imprisoning tray was taken away—and circulated through the plane.
    But they did not like to see you drifting down the aisle or perching on the arm of a seat. She had been sent back to her place when the “turbulence” announcement came over the loud-speaker, and after that they had shown the movie, which she had watched without the earphones, trying to analyze what was happening and who the characters were. If she had had it to do over, she would not have elected the window seat, so confining; nor would she have chosen, necessarily, to be across from the clergy. Yet in fact she was glad they were along and glad they were somewhere close by, accessible to waves and smiles and a “Cheers” as she raised her bourbon glass. During the film, when the plane was dark and quiet, she could hear the Reverend’s loud carrying